Result of 9/11 is an interdependent world: Noah Samara

mumbai: noah samara is on a mission: to create information affluence among the 5.2 billion citizens of the developing world. as chairperson of the washington-based worldspace corp, mr samara's mission possible is to transform radio the way rupert murdoch and craig mccaw are changing the face of television and cellular phone services: bringing people together, without boundaries.born in 1956, the son of a former ethiopian diplomat realised as a student at the university of california at berkeley that information was the key to expanding opportunities. this vision led him in 1990 to found worldspace, a company that aims to deliver quality information and entertainment to the developing world at an affordable price by using satallite-based infrastructure. the company broadcasts its programmes from satellites to portable radio receivers, a concept known as direct-to-person. worldspace is the first company to introduce direct-to-person digital- compression technology for audio and multimedia in africa, the middle east and south east asia. the times of india met up with the globetrotter in the city last week, as he stopped en route to hyderabad, where he was to meet andhra pradesh chief minister n. chandrababu naidu. excerpts from the exclusive tete-a-tete: let's start from the beginning. how did you think of introducing cutting-edge technology for the third world? look, there's a dearth of content and information flow in the developing world. more than a material gap, there is a glaring information gap that needs to be addressed at the earliest. so more than getting food, they want to know how to get food. on a sustained basis, regularly. and that's where information comes in. from just radio broadcasts, you have also ventured into delivery of one-way multimedia service through the ubiquitous pc. can you tell us how your credo of social development can be effected through such multimedia services? our multimedia service is a natural consequence of what is fundamentally a digital service. think of a community environment in africa or in rural india where they are starved of quality news, information and entertainment. think what can happen if a cheap digital service is made available to them 24 hours a day, seven days a week. not only this, if you extend the concept, the service can be made available to schools and even social enterprises as well. but given the high costs of your receivers (upwards of $200), do you think the developing world can afford them? don't you think there is an inherent clash of ideas here? i hope not. see, the affluent are not information affluent. so, they are still my customers. then, of course, we have managed to bring the prices of our receivers down by almost 50 per cent over the past year and we hope to continue the process further. once volumes increase, costs will come down automatically. during the 1994 genocide killings in africa, several extremists used direct radio broadcasts to exhort the hutus to kill the tutsis. post 9/11 and 12/13, don't you think there is a possibility for misusing your direct- to-person communication vehicle by global terrorist organisations for their own cause? and especially so, given the allegations that osama bin laden was recently using certain networks to communicate with his accomplices abroad? i understand the implications of your question. but let me tell you that we have certain processes in place before content reaches you. although we follow certain minimal standards of international broadcasting, it would be tricky to say that we do elaborate editorial checks. in case a broadcaster violates some minimal parameters, we blank them out from our platform completely. coming back to your multimedia service, worldspace today allows a user to only download information or entertainment from your satellite. don't you think a one-way communication has its own limitations, especially in case of the internet, which gained momentum because of its interactivity? we have the technology to allow reverse path (the path through which one sends information back to the sender) and we have also done some pilot projects on this. but one- way communication is not so much of a limitation for the net which, for most purposes, is more of one way than otherwise. today, there is a glut of information on the superhighway and people don't know which way to go. there's lot of information but there's no guide. how would you compare the indian market with that of other developing countries, like china, say, for instance? i think the need in most countries across the world for information and entertainment is the same. only the type of information demanded is different and so is the difference culturally and linguistically. as one of the global pioneers of direct-to-person communication, how do you foresee the future of communication evolving in the future? i see a lot of interconnectivity happening as the ability to reach people through different means increases. in essence, what we are doing is replicating externally how we communicate internally within our own body. miniaturisation will increase and so will our ability to destroy ourselves. the outcome of 9/11 has been the recognition that we live in an interdependent world and that somebody else's problem is our own problem. and that is what interconnectivity is all about.